Senior Sells Lunch

Looking for lunch? Senior Michael Chen sells Chinese food everyday from his parents restaurant, Golden Kimtar to hungry Galileo students. He brings a combination of large portions of mongolian beef, and either chow mein, fried rice, or potstickers for $5 a box.

Michael has been selling food at school for 7 years. The idea first came to him in middle school because he wanted a way to generate money due to his lack of allowance. He thought it would be convenient to sell his parents food at school. In order to attract students to buy his food when he first started selling, Michael came up with a simple plan. He said, “I just ate in front of people to make them jealous, then I would walk around or go to areas with a lot of people to sell.” Today, he takes the food with him to all of his classes and if he doesn’t sell it by the first four periods then he will walk around at lunch; he almost always sells out. Michael can usually be found around the ROTC room and the biotech room at lunch time. Currently, Michael brings 3 boxes of food each day, “unless my parents mess up the order.” His parents make the food at the restaurant the night before so he can bring it to school in the morning. While the food is cold when he sells it, his “customers” usually just heat it up in a microwave.

Michael has a number of regular customers that he sells his food too. Some of them buy it from him multiple times a week. They continue to buy food from him for for various reasons. “I buy it because it is cheap and you get a lot of food,” says senior Henry Rutlidge, who has been buying food from Michael since his freshman year Senior Dasan KIng, another 4 year customer, adds, ”I buy it because it is actually good and much better than school lunch,” .

While Michael has generated over $3,000 in profit since he began selling, next year, with more free time in college, he may actually just work in his parents restaurant.